something I am grateful for today

[johncomic]

Before I begin drawing an episode of Space Kid!, I have all the pages already planned out as rough thumbnail sketches, which take up one “page” of a folded-in-half piece of copy paper. So there's a little bundle of folded papers sitting there patiently while I draw the Big Real Pages®. This is an old part of my process, I did the exact same thing with Dishman, too...

This weekend I was working from the first folded sheet while I drew one of the earliest Big Real Pages® of Episode Two... and then I noticed that the rest of the bundle of rough planning pages was gone.

Normally I leave my roughs somewhere in plain view where I can't miss them. Failing that, I have a couple of fave “Safe Spots” where I keep Important Work Sutff®. I couldn't see this bundle anywhere. I checked all my Safe Spots. Nada. Vanished.

Then I had to try and remember if I had recently had the bundle in my hand at a time when I was interrupted and called upon to do something else [which, some days, feels like it happens constantly]. Cuz when that happens, I have a tendency to Put Things Down “Somewhere” “For A Second”, and that “Somewhere” could be anywhere.

I searched for an hour or two, getting quite anxious at the thought of losing literally weeks of work. (And needing to replan all those dozens of pages from scratch, while a new deadline looms each week to complete the Big Real Pages. I mean, I could do it if I had to, but it would be really hard.)

Then, suddenly, in answer to a little prayer an hour earlier, I remembered where I put them. And there they were. Cue huge sigh of relief and another little prayer of thanks.

Explanation: I had put them somewhere in plain view where I couldn't miss them. The trick? This place was on a flat surface. And my bundle of pages is itself kinda flat.

And, despite my decades of experience, I had forgotten one of the cardinal rules of my family: if you leave a flat surface empty, or leave something flat on that flat surface, someone will cover it with something else. Or possibly several something elses.

Which means that, yes, the item which you wanted to have in plain view, is no longer so. Ergo, flat surfaces should not be used as a part of this plain-view strategem. You'd think I'd realize that by now. I mean, I'm not new here.

Anyhoo, the bundle of Episode Two pages is now in a Safe Spot, along with the bundles for Episodes One and Three. (Episode Four's bundle is yet to come!)

I am so glad they turned up in time!!